Innovators continue to face challenges from Patent
Assertion Entities (PAEs), companies that, in the President’s
words “don’t actually produce anything themselves,” and instead
develop a business model “to essentially leverage and hijack
somebody else’s idea and see if they can extort some money out of
them.” These entities are commonly known as “patent
trolls.”

The idea is that you mire a company in patent lawsuits so
that it's easier for the company to just cough up a settlement
than waste vast amounts of money in the courts.

Next, take a look at the combined legal, settlement and
lawsuit resolution costs to actual businesses. In 2011, companies
were forced to spend $29 billion on legal costs because of patent
trolls. Worst of all, that's growing annually.